set to remain in power. the people's movement for the liberation of angola has covered -- government for nearly five decades. the opposition disputes the results. this is inside story.

kim: hello and welcome to the program. i am kim vinell. angola's election commission said on thursday the governing people's movement for the liberation of angola (mpla) party had a strong lead over the opposition in the country's election. the opposition group, national union for the total independence of angola (unita), had hoped to capitalise on young people's frustrations about poverty. the mpla has ruled angola for nearly five decades. most of it under president jose eduardo dos santos, who was in power from 1979-2017. let's take a look at some of the key moments. the country gained independence in 1975. that marked the end of

portugal's colonial rule of angola. it was also the start of the civil war. the former president became president in 1979. he attempted to improve relations with the west, especially the united states. in 2002, the conflict came to an end. the last election was held in 2017, when incumbent president joao lourenco succeeded dos santos. let's bring in our guests. jose gama, member of the mudei civic movement. an organization that works for fair elections. borges nhamirre, research consultant at the institute for security studies africa.

and marisa lourenco, independent political analyst with a focus on angola, mozambique and south africa. she is not related to angola's president. a very warm welcome to each of you. as we have been saying, polling has showed that the mpla is i had. we are waiting for the total vote count. do you think this is a done deal and the mpla will retain power? marisa: it seems to be. although unita has said it will challenge the result. since a third of the results were announced last night, the gap has closed.

you need test drilling with about 44%. it is close, but with the vote almost at the end of counting, it is unlikely to catch up to the mpla. kim: as we heard there, the opposition is disputing the results. how is that likely to play out? what will happen next? jose: thank you for having me. we do not know the 2.5 million people. the electoral commission would not accept to remove those 2.5 million dead people.

according to what they announce, they said they are winning these elections. yesterday, the commission announced the mpla was ahead with more than 60%. today, they think the mpla is having 52%. angola was running the voting center for many years. people realized the problem of angola was from those from a single person who was jose eduardo dos santos. so in 2017, dos santos stepped down and lourenco came. after some time, he was doing almost the same as dos santos. the lives of the people did not change that much.

so now people believe the problem is the system itself. that is why now people went to vote, went to decide. this was to penalize the ruling party. kim: we heard you was doing a parallel count, apart from the commission. if these two sides are coming up with different results, what will happen? could that lead to violence? borges: i think, yes. postelection violence is something that was already expected in angola. the citizens do not trust the

electoral body. whatever the results, the people will not trust in that. we can see that in the capital of angola, unida -- unita is winning. a means we can foresee some kind of unrest for the final results. kim: what has the playing field and like in the lead up to the elections? marisa: there has been a great concern over transparency about vote counting. that is because last year, parliament passed a law that would centralize vote counting and this meant instead of votes being counted, they would be counted centrally.

this has raised a lot of concern that because the national electoral commission are partial to the mpla, they could be more widespread manipulation. we have seen the ruling party quite nervous of unita having popularity. it has moved away from its party -- reputation as a part of war veterans. kim: we have seen that it is nervous. even if the mpla wins, has won a must -- much smaller percentage than previously. how has this election been different?

jose: compared to the previous election, the voters were the ones who tried to control for themselves the election. the people are the ones who are supporting unita. what we expect in these elections, it should be in the results by municipality by municipality.

they just announce the votes from improving child -- provincial. those votes they announce, there is no technical value. you do not know whether -- where he comes from. even though you can go to the web page, you cannot realize if those votes are really credible. compared to the previous election, we are going to have them in parliament.

they need a balance of parliament. kim: how has the lourenco presidency been? borges: the first year was frustrating to the majority of the angolans. there had been problems like the covid pandemic. unemployment in angola is so high. prices for goods have been soaring the lab. and southern angola there is a drought which is killing people and livestock. in summary, their lives are not improving in angola. instead, if u.s. them how

difficult was their life in 2017 , it was better in 2017. lourenco's leg and in difficult times, globally, but also in angola. unfortunately, it has not improved a lot. that is why he wants to make his second term different. the democracy in angola did not improved at all. it is considered a non-free country. i think the performance of lourenco was very low compared

to the expectations of the people of angola. kim: would you agree about that? has he been presided over a non-free country? marisa: i agree. angola is only a nominal democracy. i think we are looking at an angola that it is a different. i think it has been a mixed bag of success and filled with contradictions. but i do not think we should say he has not changed much or at least recorded some achievements. the main achievement of the lourenco administration has been tackling the debt load. it reached over 120% of total gdp in 2020 and he has had to manage that during the pandemic and the russian-ukraine

conflict. it has not been easy at all. what the lourenco did since coming into office, it predicated its budget on the worst case to nara for the oil crisis. it really showed commitment to cutting superfluous spending, which was quite a big task because he did not have much room to do that. the actual standard of living has not improved in angola. the achievement has not trickled down. angola is one of the most unequal societies in the world and that is clear to see. and that is something that has not improved. he did tackle some cases of corruption. there are still some people in

government they have not had to answer for corruption. and i think one of the biggest disappointments for lourenco was the failure to uphold its promise to hold local elections in 2020. this came about because the mpla understood that unita was more popular in urban areas. so again, a mixed bag of success for lourenco. kim: people and then 30's, make up more than two thirds of angola's population. many of them have no memory of the civil war. how does that shape what they want to see, what is important to them and who they vote for? >> one of the things we have to

understand is that in this election there were new voters of a 18-24. in angola, unemployment rates are 50% -- 58%. those are the ones who are contesting the power of president lourenco. those are the ones who voted against the mpla. the ruling party refused to accept that one the young people protests, they become very angry with the way the ruling party deals with them. there would be new voters that

there are people that never -- they have new ideas and they are not related to those who came in from the gorilla. they are coming from university while protestant president lourenco. in 2027, it will look like we -- in 2017, --. during the last five years, it fails in some points with

corruption. the central point of corruption in angola was the oil state company. during the five years, she never investigated. there are no officials facing trial or penalized. kim: unita has been accused of not making its strategies clear, other than being against mpla. what is your take on this? borges: we see that you need that candidates -- unita candidates are bringing fresh ideas.

if we look to angola now, the one who has led the state and making all that confusion, that created second-class citizens. that is just one example of a clear proposal from mike unita candidate. -- a unita candidate. i think angola never saw him. kim: all of you have expressed concerns about the transparency of the elections. if that is the case, if these

elections were not free and fair, has there been any improvement that you have seen in terms of the country's democracy, the health of the country's political life? marisa: not particularly. at the beginning of lourenco's term, he invited civil society activists and he extended a hand to them. he promised to make the media landscape more fair. but he went back on those promises. there was hope that there would be a much less critical political environment. but without the mpla up to the same old tactics. the police are partial to the mpla. you see a harsh crackdown.

if we look at those election periods, we see state media give biased reporting towards the mpla. they basically just ran stories about the ruling party and lourenco. the state newspapers as well. we have not really seen much of an improvement, although there was optimism at the beginning that this would be a little bit different. kim: how difficult it life right now for ordinary angolans in terms of the cost of living, the ability to access basic necessities? jose: well, we have 28 million

people and the level of poverty is very high. it is one of the failures of president lourenco. there was a big expectation when he came to power. he was trying to move angola to very good standards, but after some time, the president realized, he made a choice between saving angola and saving the ruling party. he decided to save the ruling party. let's say he was trying to promote, after two years, he might monopolize the media.

you could see also in those elections, he was blaming them as the one who were not delivering. kim: we have come almost to the end of the show. we have about a minute left. assuming the mpla does get into power, how does it plan to improve people's lives to diversify the economy to make the cost of living more palatable for people? marisa: to be honest, i do not

know if it has a specific plan to do that. but i think what we can expect as the government to continue with its economic reform agenda. i do not think it will reverse any of the games that it has made. i think it won't remain quite conservative. one of the biggest challenges is that it needs to hold local elections. it needs to show it is moving into a more democratic space. i am not sure how that will play out. it is a balancing act that lourenco needs to take charge of. some people do not like his changes. he has to manage those and i think he has his hands full. kim: thank you very much for that. thank you to all of our guests. and think you too for watching. it can see the program again any time by visiting our website.

for further discussion, go to our facebook page. you can also join the conversation on twitter. for me and the whole team here, goodbye for now.

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